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What You Want
by Maureen N. McLane'McLane is a Romantic poet out of time' Ange Mlinko'Passionate, erudite, sensuous . . . McLane probes the minutest currents of human feeling' Sarah Howe'My favourite living poet . . . [her work] bristles with life, feeling, argument' Parul SeghalThe witty, searching new collection by National Book Award finalist Maureen N. McLane, musing on the sea, ageing, love and the climate crisisIn her first book of poems since What I'm Looking For: Selected Poems 2005-2017, Maureen N. McLane offers a bravura collection of perceptive poetic meditations. What You Want is a book of landscapes, mindscapes, and shifting moods. Here are poems filled with gulls and harbours, blinking red lights and empty lobster traps, beach roses and rumoured sharks, eels and crows, wind turbines and superhighways. Sensitive, lyrical, alert to seasons and pressures on our shared life, McLane registers and gives form to an ambient unease. From Sappho to Constable, from constellations to microplastics, What You Want is a collection as alive to the cosmos as it is to our moment. This is McLane's cloudy-sky book: a voyage through lambent autumns and shining winters, in which an eye looks out on what it longs for, what it loves, and asks: will it survive the coming heat?
What’s the Worst Thing You Can Do to Shakespeare?
by R. Burt J. YatesWhat's the worst thing you can do to Shakespeare? The answer is simple: don't read him. To that end, Richard Burt and Julian Yates embark on a project of un/reading the Bard, turning the conventional challenges into a roadmap for textual analysis and a thorough reconsideration of the plays in light of their absorption into global culture.
When Art Touches Life
by Asif AliWhen art touches life we are left with questions and very few concrete answers. Why do we live? Why do we die? Why do we invent? Why is the world as it is? What would our lives be like in an ideal world? For years, poets, artists and great thinkers have pontificated on these questions and others, and this rich, vivid collection of poetry offers fresh considerations of the myriad possible answers.
When I’m a Mummy Like You!
by David O’ConnellBeing a mummy must be so much fun… musn’t it? Sweet and hilarious family fun from a fabulous author/illustrator pairing.
When My Brother Was an Aztec
by Natalie DiazFROM THE WINNER OF THE 2021 PULITZER PRIZE IN POETRYWhen My Brother Was an Aztec is a work of courage and invention - one that foregrounds the particularities of family dynamics and individual passion against the backdrop of Western mythologies and a deeply rooted cultural history. Natalie Diaz's arresting debut explores a brother's addiction and its devastating effects on a household, while offering a political critique of our nations and their pasts. It acknowledges absences and uncomfortable silences, as well as conjuring vivid voices and presences, from Antigone and Houdini to Huitzilopochtli and Jesus.Stolen cowboy boots, violins on fire; a mariachi band playing in the bathroom, a black bayonet carried between the shoulder blades; the beauty of busted fruit, the sight of hellish visions - Diaz both revels and reveals through her distinctive use of language and imagery, bringing to life every intimate and communal encounter, blooming abundance from scarcity. The result is a wrenching portrayal of sacrifice, want, despair and fortitude that feels truly transformative.
When Poems Fall From the Sky
by Zaro WeilNominated for the 2023 Yoto Carnegie Medal for Writing and the Yoto Carnegie Medal for Illustration.Original, inspiring and intimate, When Poems Fall From the Sky marries science and poetry to create a tender and thoughtful love-letter to Earth promising children a riot of imagination, humour and joy – the perfect book to celebrate National Poetry Day on 6th October.The collection of poems, raps, rhymes, haiku and little plays is written by Zaro Weil, winner of the 2020 CLiPPA children's poetry prize and is illustrated in full colour throughout by artist Junli Song.When Poems Fall From the Sky is the first title to publish since the pair won the coveted CLiPPA prize with their stunning poetry anthology, Cherry Moon.In exquisitely illustrated full-colour pages, trees, birds, animals, rivers, flowers, mountains and insects each share their own magical stories. And the stories they tell, the 'poems' that fall from the sky, subtly and powerfully illuminate our hope and collective role as guardians of our earth.
When The Teacher Isn't Looking: And Other Funny School Poems (Giggle Poetry)
by Kenn NesbittStudents and teachers will roar as Kenn Nesbitt pokes fun at silly school topics with dozens of wacky poems. Who knew school lunches and detention could be so funny? Kenn Nesbitt, that's who! Do you attend a school like the one Kenn Nesbitt describes in this hysterically funny collection of poems? There's a frenzied food fight in the cafeteria. For show-and-tell, kids burp the ABCs. Recently, "pet days" have been banned (and for good reason). And the funniest things happen when the teacher isn't looking. Kids and teachers rate these rhymes A+ (and you will, too).
When the World Is Ready for Bed
by Anna Currey Ms Gillian ShieldsJoin the rabbit family as they go through their end-of-day routine, from having their tea to brushing their teeth, sharing a story and being tucked up in bed. With delectable art and a warm, lyrical story, this beautiful picture book is a classic in the making.Brilliantly read by Claire Skinner. Please note that audio is not supported by all devices, please consult your user manual for confirmation.
When the World Is Ready for Bed
by Gillian ShieldsA family of rabbits go through their end-of-day routine, from having their tea to brushing their teeth, sharing a story and being tucked up in bed, until they peek out of the window and see something that's a change from their usual routine in this classic picture book.With delectable art and warm, lyrical text, this is a thoroughly modern picture book with strong echoes of books such as The Velveteen Rabbit and the works of Beatrix Potter.
When the World Is Ready for Bed
by Gillian Shields Anna CurreyWhen the world / Is ready for bed / The sky grows dark / The sun glows red.The little flowers / Shut their eyes / The night birds sing / Their lullabiesTold with a gently rhyming text, this lovely story of the world falling asleep is just right for soothing babies and toddlers at bedtime.
Where Have You Been?: Selected Essays
by Michael HofmannMichael Hofmann - a poet, translator, and intellectual vagabond - has established himself as one of the keenest critics of contemporary literature. Safely nestled between the covers of Where Have You Been?, he offers a hand to guide us and an encouraging whisper in our ear, leading us on a trip through what to read, how to think, and why to like. And while these essays bear sharp insights that will help us revisit writers with a fresh eye, they are also a story of love between a reader and his treasured books. In these twenty-five essays, Hofmann brings his signature wit and sustained critical mastery to a poetic, penetrating, and candid discussion of the writers and artists of the last hundred years. Here are the indispensable poets without which contemporary poetry would be unimaginable - Elizabeth Bishop, 'the poets' poets' poet,' the 'ghostly skill' of Robert Lowell, and the man he calls the greatest English poet since Shakespeare, Ted Hughes. But he also illumines the despair of John Berryman and the antics of poetry's bogeyman, Frederick Seidel. In essays on art that are themselves works of art, Hofmann's agile and brilliant mind explores a panoply of subjects from the mastery of translation to the best day job for a poet. What these diverse gems share are the critic's insatiable curiosity and great charm. Where Have You Been? is an unmissable journey with literature's most irresistible flaneur.
Where Is All My Relation?: The Poetics of Dave the Potter
by Michael A. ChaneyWhere Is All My Relation? presents the first sustained academic discussion of the poetry, pottery, and culture of David Drake, an antebellum slave who distinguished himself by composing verse on the ceramics he produced in the years leading up to the Civil War. During the 1830s, 40s, and 50s, he incised couplets and signatures (a singular "Dave") onto the incredibly large storage vessels that he made. In fact, his stoneware pots and jars are among the largest made in North America during the antebellum era, and craft enthusiasts and appraisers are still proclaiming their precision and ambitious volume. Rich with biblical allusions, historical facts, and personal opinions, his art provides unique insights into the lives of slaves, craftsmen, and the culture of the American South in the first half of the nineteenth century. The essays here engage with the historical context and major issues that Drake's work provokes, among them: prohibitions against slave literacy; Drake's privileged status compared to other slaves at the time; the interpretive status of his material craft objects; the influence of contemporary African American poet George Moses Horton; and Drake's ability to sell his pottery despite the fact that slaves were not officially permitted to participate in a cash economy. Featuring essays by literary critics, art-historians, archaeologists, and curators, Where Is All My Relation? provides a window into the world of nineteenth century material culture and expands our traditional understanding of the slave-narrative genre.
Where Is All My Relation?: The Poetics of Dave the Potter
Where Is All My Relation? presents the first sustained academic discussion of the poetry, pottery, and culture of David Drake, an antebellum slave who distinguished himself by composing verse on the ceramics he produced in the years leading up to the Civil War. During the 1830s, 40s, and 50s, he incised couplets and signatures (a singular "Dave") onto the incredibly large storage vessels that he made. In fact, his stoneware pots and jars are among the largest made in North America during the antebellum era, and craft enthusiasts and appraisers are still proclaiming their precision and ambitious volume. Rich with biblical allusions, historical facts, and personal opinions, his art provides unique insights into the lives of slaves, craftsmen, and the culture of the American South in the first half of the nineteenth century. The essays here engage with the historical context and major issues that Drake's work provokes, among them: prohibitions against slave literacy; Drake's privileged status compared to other slaves at the time; the interpretive status of his material craft objects; the influence of contemporary African American poet George Moses Horton; and Drake's ability to sell his pottery despite the fact that slaves were not officially permitted to participate in a cash economy. Featuring essays by literary critics, art-historians, archaeologists, and curators, Where Is All My Relation? provides a window into the world of nineteenth century material culture and expands our traditional understanding of the slave-narrative genre.
Where She Always Was: Poems By Frannie Lindsay (Swenson Poetry Award)
by Frannie LindsayIn his foreword, J.D. McClatchy speaks of the musical qualities of Lindsay's work: "It is impossible, reading her poems, not to hear a musical hand at work. This is not just a matter of delicacy or virtuosity. It is also a matter of knowing how to phrase a line... Lindsay moves from detail to trope with utter poise, with an intuitive sense of what to sustain or emphasize. Her language is crisp. I can pick a stanza at random... and praise its plosive energy, its modulated vowels, its variety and elan... Where She Always Was allows us . . . the rare gratification of watching a poet--wonderfully accomplished, quietly persuasive--look back on a lifetime's worth of emotions and calculate their bearing on the present. In her craft is the truth."
Wherever You Are My Love Will Find You
by Nancy Tillman. . . I wanted you more than you'll ever know,so I sent love to follow wherever you go . . .Love is the greatest gift we have to give our children. It's the one thing they can carry with them each and every day.If love could take shape it might look something like these heartfelt words and images from the inimitable Nancy Tillman. Wherever You Are My Love Will Find You is a book to share with your loved ones, no matter how near or far, young or old, they are.
Which Sin to Bear?: Authenticity and Compromise in Langston Hughes
by David E. ChinitzLangston Hughes survived as a writer for over forty years under conditions that made survival virtually heroic. Determined on a literary career at a time when no African American had yet been able to live off his or her writing, Hughes not only faced poverty and racism but found himself pressed by the conflicting hopes, expectations, and demands of readers and critics. He relied on his skill as a mediator among competing positions in order to preserve his art, his integrity, and his unique status as the poetic voice of ordinary African Americans. Which Sin To Bear? explores Hughes's efforts to negotiate the problems of identity and ethics he faced as an African American professional writer and intellectual. The book traces his early efforts to fashion himself as an "authentic" black poet of the Harlem Renaissance and his later imagining of a new and more inclusive understanding of authentic blackness. It examines Hughes's lasting, yet self-critical commitment to progressive politics in the mid-century years. And it shows how, in spite of his own ambivalence--and, at times, anguish--Hughes was forced to engage in ethical compromises to achieve his personal and social goals. The book is also the first to analyze Hughes's executive-session testimony before Joseph McCarthy's Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, which was unavailable to the public for half a century. David Chinitz digs into Hughes's creative work, newspaper columns, letters, and unpublished papers to reveal a writer who faced a daunting array of dicey questions and intimidating obstacles, and whose triumphs and occasional missteps are a fascinating and telling part of his legacy.
Whit If?: Scotland's history as it micht hiv bin
by Hugh McMillanHugh McMillan’s first collection in Scots, Whit if? poses the questions that you never thought to ask about Scottish history like ‘Whit if Alexander haed Twitter?’, ‘Whit if John Knox haed fawen in luve wi Mary Queen o Scots?’ and ‘Whit if Jacques Brel haed jynt the Corries?’ As both poet and long-time student of Scotland’s strange and undervalued history, McMillan is the ideal guide to all the micht-hiv-bins of Scottish history, as well as all that wis. Humour is guaranteed, but that doesn’t mean he won’t be digging up many an educational gem along the way!
The White Rose of Gask: The Life and Songs of Carolina Oliphant, Lady Nairne
by Freeland BarbourCarolina Oliphant, Lady Nairne, a contemporary of Robert Burns, wrote over 80 songs which enjoyed great popularity during her lifetime and still do so up to the present day. They are some of Scotland’s most famous traditional songs – including ‘Charlie Is My Darling’, ‘A Hundred Pipers’, ‘Will Ye No’ Come Back Again’ and ‘The Laird of Cockpen’. Despite their popularity, she shunned publicity and never acknowledged her authorship in her lifetime, even concealing it from her husband for a time. After her death, the publication in 1846 of her collected songs and poems as Lays from Strathearn revealed her secret.Partly because of her lifelong reticence, details of her biography and her personality have remained little-known though her songs are famous, and this important Scottish literary figure has been neglected. Freeland Barber, a descendent of Lady Nairne, now presents a long-overdue biography and reassessment of her life and work, much of it based on research into family papers to which he has recently had access.
Whitman's Queer Children: America's Homosexual Epics
by Catherine A. DaviesDavies examines the work of four of the most important twentieth-century poets who have explored the epic tradition. Some of the poems display an explicit concern with ideas of American nationhood, while others emulate the formal ambitions and encyclopaedic scope of the epic poem. The study undertakes extensive close readings of Hart Crane's The Bridge (1930), Allen Ginsberg's "Howl†? (1956) and The Fall of America: Poems of These States 1965-71 (1972), James Merrill's The Changing Light at Sandover (1982), and John Ashbery's Flow Chart (1991). Although not primarily an account of a Whitmanian lineage, this book considers Whitman's renegotiation of the dialectic between the public and the private as a context for the project of the homosexual epic, arguing for the existence of a genealogy of epic poems that rethink the relationship between these two spheres. If, as Bakhtin suggests, the job of epic is to "accomplish the task of cultural, national, and political centralization of the verbal-ideological world,†? the idea of the "homosexual epic†? fundamentally problematizes the traditional aims of the genre.
Whitman's Queer Children: America's Homosexual Epics
by Catherine A. DaviesThe first full-length study to explore the idea of a ‘gay epic’ in American poetry.
The Whitsun Weddings
by Philip LarkinPhilip Larkin (1922-1985) remains England's best-loved poet - a writer matchlessly capable of evoking his native land and of touching all readers from the most sophisticated intellectual to the proverbial common reader. The late John Betjeman observed that 'this tenderly observant poet writes clearly, rhythmically, and thoughtfully about what all of us can understand'. Behind this modest description lies a poet who made greatness look, in Milton's prescription, 'simple, sensuous and passionate'. This collection, first published in 1967, contains many of his best-loved poems, including The Whitsun Weddings, An Arundel Tomb, Days, Mr Bleaney and MCMXIV. 9780571259281 9780571097104 9780571259441
The Whitsun Weddings (York Notes Advanced Ser.)
by Philip LarkinPhilip Larkin (1922-1985) remains England's best-loved poet - a writer matchlessly capable of evoking his native land and of touching all readers from the most sophisticated intellectual to the proverbial common reader. The late John Betjeman observed that 'this tenderly observant poet writes clearly, rhythmically, and thoughtfully about what all of us can understand'. Behind this modest description lies a poet who made greatness look, in Milton's prescription, 'simple, sensuous and passionate'.This collection, first published in 1967, contains many of his best-loved poems, including The Whitsun Weddings, An Arundel Tomb, Days, Mr Bleaney and MCMXIV.
Who Is Mary Sue?
by Sophie CollinsIn the language of fan fiction, a 'Mary Sue' is an idealised and implausibly flawless character: a female archetype that can infuriate audiences for its perceived narcissism.Such is the setting for this brilliant and important debut by Sophie Collins. In a series of verse and prose collages, Who Is Mary Sue? exposes the presumptive politics behind writing and readership: the idea that men invent while women reflect; that a man writes of the world outside while a woman will turn to the interior.Part poetry and part reportage, at once playful and sincere, these fictive-factive miniatures deploy original writing and extant quotation in a mode of pure invention. In so doing, they lift up and lay down a revealing sequence of masks and mirrors that disturb the reflection of authority.A work of captivation and correction, this is a book that will resonate with anyone concerned with identity, shame, gender, trauma, composition and culture: everyone, in other words, who wishes to live openly and think fearlessly in the modern world. Who Is Mary Sue? is a work for our times and a question for our age: it is a handbook for all those willing to reimagine prescriptive notions of identity and selfhood.
Who Is Ozymandias?: And other Puzzles in Poetry
by John FullerPart of the pleasure of poetry is unravelling the mysteries and difficulties it contains and solving the puzzles that lie within. Who, for instance, is Ozymandias? What is the Snark? Who is the Emperor of Ice-Cream? Or indeed, who is 'you' in a poem? In this perceptive and playful new book, acclaimed poet John Fuller looks at some of our greatest poems and considers the number of individual puzzles at their heart, casting light on how we should approach these conundrums as readers. From riddling to double entendres, mysterious titles to red herrings, Fuller unpicks the puzzles in works that range from Browning to Bishop, Empson to Eliot, Shelley to Stevens, to help us reach the rewards and revelations that lie at the centre of some of our best-loved poems.